Prey
by Thrythlind
Summary: A team of hit men are sent to kill a potential witness. She runs into an old warehouse.


The structure before her looked as if it hadn't been used in years, it was obviously   
    a death trap waiting to happen. She didn't have much choice though, her police   
    guard was dead and Hei Shen's men were closing fast on her, she could hear them   
    searching. Shandra was lucky to have stayed alive this long into the night, but that   
    all comes with the thief's career. The warehouse might not be the safest place in   
    most circumstances, but it would have numerous hiding spots. She entered its past   
    its half-rotted entryway with less than a moments delay.
    Once inside she found herself in a maze of stacked boxes arranged apparently at   
    random. Preceeding along a quickly chosen path she found that it twisted and   
    curved with narrow corridors that suddenly became wide open rooms. Everywhere   
    there were deep shadows where anything could be hiding. Behind her she heard the   
    doors creak open to allow those hunting her inside. She slowed down to keep quite   
    and find a place to remain hidden from their searching syes. Behind her the hit   
    squad moved silently and confidently, they had already killed all the cops and feds at   
    the safehouse and she was all that they had to deal with.
    Shandra had started to give up when a section of the crate wall opened quietly to   
    the side like a door seemingly of its own accord. The opening was small and she   
    had to crawl to get in, but once in the crate she found it easy to close up the wall   
    again. The back of the crate was missing and opened into a room where the   
    concrete floor appeared to have been ripped out and the dirt underneath showed   
    through. There were no other exits from the room, except up, but that was a rough   
    climb and liable to cause more trouble than it was worth. She decided to wait out   
    the search inside this strange room. She thought she heard something behind her,   
    but shrugged it off. Outside the hit squad had split up to seach the large warehouse   
    from top to bottom, and they were a more tangible concern.
    Thomas Garrison was a veteran of many wars over his years as a merc, and had   
    performed many assassinations as well. In his thirty eight years of such service he   
    had thought that he had seen everything, this was about to change. Off to his left he   
    thought that he had caught a glimmer in the shadows, he passed his flashlight across   
    the area, his forty-five quickly following. The thin light of the infra-red beam picked   
    up nothing in the recesses of the maze, he quickly turned his attention back to the   
    main corridor. His light seemed to illuminate a thin, masculine face, but he passed   
    over it to quick the first time to be sure. Bringing his light back again he found   
    nothing.
    "What's the matter, nervous?" whispered a voice behind him. Thomas whirled to   
    face a tall black haired man in a dark overcoat. The merc whirled to bring his gun to   
    bear, but the tall man had already immobilized him and covered his mouth to prevent   
    a warning yell. "This looks to be thirsty work, I think I might take a drink." Then   
    thomas felt the prick of fangs piercing his skin and a wave of paralyzing ecstacy hit   
    him, seconds later his drained carcass hit the floor. The tall man picked up   
    Thomas's gun and examined it with slitted eyes before crushing it in his hand, new   
    blood refreshing and enhancing his strength beyond human levels.
    On the other side of the building another expierenced veteran of such operations   
    performed his sweep. Hei Shen had hired good help, Shandra could pull him down,   
    much farther down than he intended to go. The invisible infra-red beam swept back   
    and forth illuminated everything it touched to the wearer of a pair of IR glasses.   
    The merc, a martial-arts enthuisiast by the sword, moved as quietly as any many   
    could searching out everywhere his quarry could be. He heard his opponent before   
    he could see him and, expecting it to be the girl, whirled with a cry of triumph. He   
    found his target almost instantly and saw it wasn't exactly who he was expecting.   
    He slashed down with his sword as the man disappeared before his eyes. Bruce, as   
    he was called by what friends he had for his true name was not known, almost   
    thought that his eyes had been decieving him.
    "You're too slow," came the whisper behind him moments before, a clawed hand   
    shoved it's way through his back and out of his chest holding his crushed heart.   
    "What a messy way to die." The man whispered as Bruce's death wail echoed   
    through the warehouse. The dark man cupped his hands and saved some of the   
    blood before it all ran out into the ground. "Nice vintage." he muttered as his   
    glowing, slitted eyes scanned for the next trail of infra-red light, and claws shrank   
    into long fingernails.
    In her little hideaway, Bruce's death wail suddenly woke her from an exhausted   
    sleep. She resisted the temptation to leave the secret room and escape, but that   
    temptation was getting harder to resist with each new sound.
    "Sounds like we have her," Blazer said at Bruce's first cry. Then the pained wail   
    echoed through the building and his initial belief was shot down. He walked more   
    carefully now, constantly watching his back and sweeping his flashlight. A few   
    minutes later he came to a large area where the concrete had been ripped from the   
    ground. "Center of the maze," he whispered to himself upon seeing the seven other   
    exits.
    "No just a resting place," came a voice from below. The street punk dropped his   
    flashlight down to see a man emerge as if he were a ghost. Not a single grain of the   
    dirt was shifted. The flashlight briefly illuminated fangs in red light as the man,   
    moving faster than Blaer could see, grappled him into a lock and sank his fangs into   
    a conveinent artery on Blazer's wrist.. Soon afterward he collapsed, still alive.   
    "What's the matter, feeling anemic?" asked the vampire as he crushed Blazer's head   
    in one hand. His physical power was as high now as he could make it. Two more   
    light trails to follow, he saw, but he smelled more than that. "This may be a   
    challenge after all.
    Jacob found Thomas's bloodless corpse, but he couldn't find the cause of death.   
    There were no marks on the body, and the face was merely a mask of terror.
    "Poison," he thought, but he couldn't think of what kind.
    Off to the side the remains of Thomas's custom-made gun lay scattered about in   
    the ground. His nightsight goggles revealed nothing to him that spoke of company,   
    but he was cautious anyway. As he made ready to move another stream of the IR   
    light tumbled as Blazer fell prey to their opponent, but only Jacob was watching for   
    such signs now.
    Shadow followed closely behind her partner Demon, nervous as hell. Demon was   
    sweeping his flashlight back and forth so Shadow had switched off hers. A recess   
    suddnely appeared to the right, but a through examination by Demons light showed   
    nothing there. Shadow didn't look into the recess as she passed thinking it secure.   
    Nor did Demon hear her muffled cry when she was pulled into the recess. Shadow   
    struggled but couldn't break her assailants iron grip.
    "Don't worry, you'll enjoy the trip to hell, but don't ask about the stay," the   
    whisper was right at her ear, and she felt the rage in her struggle against the raw   
    power of her opponent. Then the fangs sunk into her neck, and she forgot all about   
    struggling. The flood of ecstacy she felt when the points pricked her skin was   
    greater than any she had ever known. Her chest heaved as the life was slowly   
    drained from her. The look on her face when the dead body hit the ground was one   
    of surprise and shock as she realized that there never had been a chance.
    Ahead Demon, turned to look for his partner and found nothing. He quickly ran   
    back to find her, arriving in time to see her body hit the ground. "Bastard!" he cried   
    as he flung a fist at the tall, somewhat thin man before him. Demon was well known   
    for his strength and no man had every stood before one of his punches, or surpassed   
    him in strength, until now. The dark man accepted the blow with barely a flinch at   
    the impact, and quickly lifted the larger man three feet off the ground with one hand.
    "You don't really think you can beat me, do you?" the dark man asked, and flung   
    Demon against a stack of crates which crumbled at the impact. Demon stood up,   
    bruised but refusing to be defeated and threw several more punches at his opponent.   
    The stranger merely blocked each one, moving fast enough for his arms to leave   
    trailing images that made it appear as if he had more than six arms. "Finished yet?"   
    the dark man asked Demon confidently, still speaking in a soft whisper. The large   
    man growled an answer and threw another haymaker at his opponent, only the man   
    wasn't there to take it this time. He had simply vanished, no where to be seen.
    "Ran away, huh?" yelled Demon at nothing in particular.
    "No, just changing location," Demon whirled in time to see fingernails grow into   
    claws and dive for his chest. Then there was a searing pain and the last thing he saw   
    as he died were his lungs, though it would be impossible to recognize them as such.   
    "Sorry, about that, didn't mean to take your breath away," and now the dark man   
    laughed loud and long at the brute's demise. At least two more targets were left, if   
    he was lucky they might be staying together like this pair was. Another shot rang   
    out, and he felt a bullet thud through his back and out his chest.
    He cursed himself for carelessness and turned to face his attacker, as the bullet   
    hole closed itself. His assailant took aim again and fired, the dark man accepted it   
    and walked forward as the hole over his heart closed. "You ruined my coat   
    asshole," he whispered as he sped up towards the gunman.
    When the sound of that laughter followed by gunfire echoed through the   
    warehouse, Shandra decided to leave before they decided to torch the place. She   
    exited the way she came in and quietly headed back towards the entrance. She   
    managed to get lost and arrived at Blazer's death scene soon before Jacob. Her first   
    reaction was one of shock, then fear. She recognized the headless man as one of her   
    pursuers, but what could do that to a human skull. She reached down dipped her   
    finger in the small puddle of blood next to the corpse, and licked her finger, not sure   
    why.
    "What is this place?" she asked herself. Then she felt the cold barrel against the   
    back of her skull.
    "Let's find out together. Shall we?" Jacob asked.
    Marcus took aim a third time, trying to think of what drug this creep was on to   
    keep walking after being shot twice in the chest. The third shot caught the dark   
    man in the heart again, stopping him for an instant. He could dodge, but he wanted   
    this one to realize how hopeless his situation really was. The bullets did little   
    enough damage, and what did get through his inhumanly thick skin healed quickly.   
    This time Marcus saw the wound close by itself and freaked. Shot after shot was   
    fired at the now dodging man approaching him. The dark man moved faster than   
    anything Marcus had ever hunted, and he hunted many things. Then the pistol   
    clicked empty as the dark man finally reached him.
    "That made me thirsty," whispered the dark man as fangs appeared in his mouth.   
    Marcus found himself wishing he had brought his bow and arrow as his attacker   
    caught him and drained him dry of blood. "Just us left, then, let us see if I've saved   
    the best for last," shouted the vampire once he was finished and the corpse fell to   
    the ground. Time to hunt by smell, and he knew that his prey wasn't far.
    A game of cat and mouse followed, each thinking the other the mouse.
    "Does the government hire assassins now, or are you just here by coincidence,"   
    shouted Jacob, back to wall and gun to Shandra's head. They passed by Bruce's   
    corpse and the smell of blood and death in the air sickened Shandra, making her   
    throat dry, almost burning. Jacob merely paused and scooted around the pool, even   
    he was shocked at the gaping hole in the hit-man's chest where his heart would be if   
    it weren't in pieces floating in a pool of blood.
    "You are here by coincidence, I dwell here," came the answering shout. The   
    cavernous warehouse, even with the boxes stacked high, carried the echoes to and   
    from odd places making it sound as if the shouts came from everywhere.
    "So you're homeless and the only home that you can find is an abandoned   
    warehouse. I don't believe that, not with the skill you've shown, and vagrants don't   
    have access to poisons like you used on Thomas.
    "Poison?" the dark man responded curiously. "Do you seriously not know what I   
    am yet?" Jacob was losing his cool, this man's attitude grated on his nerves. It was   
    like he was doing this for fun and not buisness.
    "I warn you," he shouted. "No matter how fast you act, I can pull this trigger and   
    blow the girl's head off." The laugh that served as a response echoed through the   
    warehouse, rebounding off wall after wall of crates.
    "Then by all means leave, if you can make it to the door," he laughed again.   
    "Before you die, don't you want to know the name of your killer?"
    "I'll get your name when I take it off your bullet-ridden corpse," he knew where to   
    go. The street-lights showed faintly through the open door acting as a beacon.   
    Getting there, however, would be difficult in this maze.
    "Oh you want my name," laughed the dark man. "I'll give it to you now to save   
    you the trouble. I am known as Dane, but I am not going to be your doom. Oh,   
    and your friend already tried bullets, and look at the good they did him."
    The more blood she smelled and saw, the sicker Shandra became. Her throat felt   
    like an inferno, and she had an overpowering drive to quench the fire. The scene of   
    Demon's death clenched and she had no other choice but to sake it.
    The laugh echoed through the building again, halting Jacob's progression. What   
    was this maniac, what kind of weapons could do what he had done. His hostage,   
    and soon to be corpse, struggled beneath his grasp, he roughly pulled back against   
    her throat.
    "Unless you want to be dead sooner than you expect stop struggling." Shandra   
    paused briefly in her attempts to free herself, but they picked up again within a few   
    seconds. The compulsion to appease the burning sensation in her throat was all she   
    was aware of now. With a sudden effort she threw off her captor, and he toppled a   
    part of crate wall ten feet away.
    "What the hell?" he asked pushing crates off of him. Then he saw the girl's   
    features twist into a bestial snarl, with fangs and eyes that blazed red even through   
    the night sight goggles. He pointed his gun and fired as Shandra seemed strecth and   
    enlongate like the Starships in those science fiction movies. Shot passed through a   
    crate behind Shandra's former position and the next thing he knew his "hostage" was   
    on top of him and sinking sharp fangs into his neck. Then all he knew was   
    overwhelming ecstacy as he was pulled into the unknown, and a overwhelming since   
    of despair when he realized what he had been trying to fight.
    Shandra dropped him, shocked at what she had done, and the last thing he knew   
    was Dane's laughter echoing across space to reach his ears.

  
  
  
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